


Simple flaws

by Kit



Category: Emelan - Tamora Pierce, PIERCE Tamora - Works
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-12
Updated: 2013-08-12
Packaged: 2017-12-23 06:12:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/922944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kit/pseuds/Kit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, Dedicate Lark finds it hard to cope. Post-<i>Healing in the Vine</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Simple flaws

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lisabounce](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lisabounce/gifts).



Lark is not always a patient teacher.

Not here. Not in the days—the weeks and months—the _year_ and more after the blue pox, when words can only come slow and thick and full of rage. Crane is better. He is fierce and stern and doesn’t let himself get tangled up, his Air discipline serving him well where Lark stutters and stumbles and retreats to her workroom with cups of tea.

Her body aches from the waiting. From the bedside vigils and from chasing Dedicates across the Temple, cajoling and scolding and _begging_ them to ssve what she could not. She can’t look at their children. She avoids Moonstream’s anxious looks and Sandry’s bewilderment. She is, she knows, supposed to greive. And supposed to do it well. She is _good,_ after all. Good in the eyes of children and animals.

She is not supposed to struggle and wince and feel cold with fright when Rosethorn cries from a death that took more than her voice. Lark imagines the garden she must have left behind. Something wild and tangled with crocuses laid about amongst the weeds. Letting her fingers snarl gently in her lover’s hair (growing out, after all these weeks inside and idle, russet and soft and probably driving Rosie half mad), she wishes she could be half of what they all say. _If I was, I could help her speak._

In the end, it’s hands that stop her. Rosethorn’s hands catching hers. Shaking her by the shoulders. And spelling out, in a mix of queer, fluid hand movements that, according to the books Crane has left scattered about their cottage, can say more than any vocal speech, that she should _please—just—_ stop.

(“Stop. I love you. I’m safe.. Please, stop.”) Feeling the small, familiar hands on her face, Lark met Rosethorn’s eyes for the first time in weeks, and laughed.

“I never knew how bad I could be in a crisis,” she mutters. “Or…after a crisis.”

Rosethorn kisses her, tracing incomprehensible letters over her back, only to pull back and grin. She pulls a pencil out from behind her ear, wincing as it tangles in a too long curl about her face.

“I’m just glad you’re human, after all,” she writes, the letters shaky but clear. “I need you _here_ , Mila-bless. Not tying yourself into knots trying to look after me. You’re not an acrobat any more.”

“I’m…I was terrified,” Lsrk admits, swallowing.  

Rosethorn’s expression softened, before turning wry as she indicated the books scattered about her room; the medicine vials half full and littering what were normally pristine surfaces; her own, full lipped and stubbornly mute mouth. She touched her lips and shrugged, cupping Lark’s cheek again.

 _You are worth all this mess_ , her body said. _Always and every time._


End file.
